dyke

1977, In Cubbaroo's dim distant pastThey built a double dyke.Back to back in the yard it stoodAn architectural dream in wood— Ian Slack-Smith, The Passing of the Twin Seater, from The Cubbaroo Tales, 1977. Quoted in Aussie Humour, Macmillan, 1988, ISBN 0-7251-0553-4, page 235.

(UK) A ditch (rarely also refers to similar natural features, and to one natural valley, Devil's Dyke, Sussex, due to a legend that the devil dug it).

(UK, mainly S England) An earthwork consisting of a ditch and a parallel rampart.

(slang, pejorative) A lesbian, particularly one who appears macho or acts in a macho manner. This word has been reclaimed, by some, as politically empowering. (See usage notes.)

Usage notes

In the sense of a gay woman, this term is generally derogatory when used by heterosexuals (sometimes when used by non-heterosexuals), but, it is also used by some lesbians and bisexual women to refer to themselves, positively. A similar approach to the possibility of reclamation is evident in the use of the word queer among some lesbians, bisexual women, and others; see reclaimed word and reappropriation for discussion. It is important to note that many people do not believe that “queer” is able to be reclaimed, because of its fraught history and continued pejorative usage. Thus, the terms “dyke” and “queer” are both potentially liberatory while also being highly contested.

Origin

Unknown; various theories suggested.

Attested US 1942, in Berrey and Van den Bark’s American Thesaurus of Slang.

Sentence Examples

A western arm has been cut off from the lake by a dyke, and in this arm a thick crust of salt is formed each year after the evaporation of the flood water.

Dr. Van Dyke was an eloquent speaker.

Shields (1825-1904), who afterwards entered the Protestant Episcopal Church, republished and urged the adoption of the Book of Common Prayer as amended by the Westminster Divines in the royal commission of 1661; and Henry Van Dyke was prominent in the latter stage of the movement for a liturgy.

A dyke called Blemund's Ditch, of unknown origin, bounded it on the south, where the land was marshy.

There have been discovered (1907) the remains of this ditch protected by a low wall or a stone dyke; some of the boundary stones which marked its course, and inscriptions mentioning it, have also been found.